Bird-in-Hand Half Marathon & 5K

Set for its annual running through the green, rolling farmlands of southeastern Pennsylvania’s Lancaster County, the Amish Country Bird-in-Hand Half Marathon & 5K that marks its 10th annual running on the weekend after Labor Day, for a race that often draws as many as 2,000 runners.

The race will follow an out-and-back course that starts and finishes on North Ronks Road near the Bird-in-Hand Family Inn.

From there, runners will follow what is basically a counter-clockwise loop route through the Amish farm country, along rolling country roads in and around this small village of roughly 300 residents whose history dates all the way back to the early 1730s, when it was founded by small communities of Quakers and Mennonites.

After a largely flat first mile, the course begins a long, steady but very gradual uphill climb over the next couple of miles, followed by what is probably the race’s biggest downhill just after runners pass the mile 4 marker after the turn from Scenic Road onto Groffdale Road.

Once runners make it past the fourth mile, the remainder of the course is mostly rolling hills punctuated by the occasional flat stretch for the rest of the course.

Along the way, runners will get to see a glimpse of what the area’s Amish families are like, as many of the Amish who live in the area will be out on the course to offer refreshment at the water stations, roughly every mile and a half to two miles along the course.

The last couple of miles, like the first mile, feature the race’s flattest terrain as runners head in toward the finish line back near the Bird-in-Hand Family Inn, where they started.

While you’re in town, you’ll also be able to take in what the race organizers are calling “Run, Ride and Soar,” a weekend athletic festival that will also feature cycling events — including 12-, 23- and 62-mile bike rides.

There’s also a hot air balloon event they’re calling the Amish Country Bike & Balloon Race, in which participants will climb aboard a hot air balloon with their bikes in tow, fly across Bird-in-Hand into the nearby Amish farmlands, and then climb out of the balloon to race on their bicycles back into town.

Race Weather & Climate

Located in southeastern Pennsylvania, about seven miles east of Lancaster and just over 60 miles west of Philadelphia, Bird-in-Hand typically sees its wettest weather of the year in September, which has brought record temperatures here as low as 34°F (in 1986) and as high as 99°F (in 1980).

On race day (Sept. 7), the average low is 57ºF and the average high is 78ºF.